Update time once again, only this one is going to be small; while I have brand new Lv. 100s and Shinies to report, this update is only about my first victory in the World Leaders Tournament! (Bare with me, though, as these battles got so intense that I can't remember everything from the previous ones.)

-Tournament Team:
-Asuna

Nature: Modest

Ability: Natural Cure

Item: Focus Sash

Venoshock / Toxic Spikes / Giga Drain / Extrasensory

-Faith

Nature: Adamant

Ability: Flame Body

Item: Lum Berry

Morning Sun / Drill Run / Flare Blitz / Wild Charge

-Ami

Nature: Adamant

Ability: Sheer Force

Item: Life Orb

Crunch / Iron Defense / Stone Edge / Iron Head

-Round One-

The first battle was against Marlon. I figured, "Asuna is my lead, so this should be a piece of cake~" I was right. ...Kinda. Marlon started off with Jellicent. I figured a Giga Drain would be enough to down it, but.. of course not. Not with my luck. Jellicent survived just outside of red HP and hit me with a Psychic. At this point my first thought was, "...Should've gone for the Toxic Spikes, taken that Psychic, then regain HP with Giga Drain next turn.. *sigh*" No matter, a second Giga Drain took it down, but Cursed Body chose to activate right at the end and disable Giga Drain.

At this point, Marlon brings out Wailord. Seeing as I can't use Giga Drain for a while, I switch into Ami thinking a Sheer Force'd Life Orb'd Iron Head would do at least half damage. ....I forgot Steel isn't effective on Water. /palmface Yeah. My fail right there deserved a /palmface and not a /facepalm. ANYWAY! On the switch, Wailord starts spamming Bounce. I get a Iron Defense up ASAP, then try to Iron Head in between Bounces, only to see it cut just less than half Wailord's HP. On Wailord's third Bounce, Ami got paralyzed. Expected it sooner, but whatevs.. I have Ami Crunch on Wailord's massive body and bam. He's down. Marlon's final Pokemon was Carracosta, which took two Iron Heads to the face before going down.

"...Thank Arceus."

-Round Two-

My second opponent was decided.. and as I looked upon her name on the board.. I silently shed a tear. Throughout the ages, Trainer after Trainer have challenged this woman and, as one may expect, Trainer after Trainer have been defeated, crushed, and tossed aside. My fellow Trainers from Johto, especially, may sympathize with my fears here. Yes, folks.. Sabrina was my next opponent in the World Leaders Tournament.

As expected, Sabrina lead off with Alakazam. There's was no way in a Holy Hell Asuna could do anything to it, so the only logical choice was to setup Toxic Spikes after surviving a Psychic thanks to Asuna's Focus Sash. Then came a Shadow Ball and down Asuna went. HOWEVUH! Faith took the stage to avenge her fallen comrade! After surviving a Psychic like an absolute BOSS, Faith delivered searing justice with Flare Blitz and fell Alakazam. Out came Slowking, and with Faith already in the red, my options were limited. "A switch could screw things up here since she still has a third Pokemon. Faith can't take another hit.. might as well go out in style!" Hoping for the best, Faith charged in with Wild Charge and dealt a very nice blow to Slowking. Faith did, however, faint from the recoil, leaving Slowking's Shadow Ball with not a target.

It was, once again, Ami's time to take the stage. She had help, however, as Asuna's Toxic Spikes had already poisoned, and damaged, Slowking after Faith's flashy exit. Slowking didn't get a chance to attack; a single Crunch ended it. Finally, Sabrina's last Pokemon, Espeon, took the stage. Automatic response; Crunch. Espeon moved first, but with a mere Calm Mind. The fight was over. Ami took down Espeon in a single attack.

"Hands.. you can stop shaking now.. Alakazam has been gone for a few turns now.."

-Final Round-

The final round. After several failures prior to the current tournament, I found it all but possible to believe I made it here. My final challenge was Roark. I knew what his lead would be, but that's what worried me. The battle began and, as I figured, Rampardos was staring us down. I prayed hard, and ordered Asuna to use Giga Drain. I was SO happy to see we went first, only to have my jaw drop as Rampardos survived using a Focus Sash and responded with a Earthquake to force us into using Asuna's own Focus Sash.. Knowing we could move faster, Asuna and I laughed as she Venoshocked Rampardos and took it down.

Asuna was already injured beyond belief, but Lady Luck was with us. Relicanth made it's appearance, as if to aid us during our time of need. An instant Giga Drain brought back more than half Asuna's HP, putting us in a good position. With the battle now 3 v 1, I felt Lady Luck watching over me. Yes.. she was watching over me.. but.. whether she was helping me or not..

Archeops took to the stage. Knowing I could do nothing, Asuna was taken down by an Earthquake. Fair enough; Asuna did an excellent job, she deserved some rest. Faith was up next. However.. Sadly, Archeops was faster. A critical Stone Edge took Faith down in one shot. We were in trouble, and I could see now that Lady Luck wasn't smiling.. but instead wore a sinister smirk. Ami was up to the challenge though. That's how she is.. Adamant even in the face of danger. Archeops attempted a Focus Blast, and missed. We had only one shot. We took it.

Sheer Force'd Life Orb'd Super effective Iron Head. One-Hit-Knock-Out. The tournament was over. The four of us came out on top.

"But it's not over yet.. We must still challenge the World Leaders nine more times. ..And then..."

"Ryana.. She's a Necromancer. Hers, however, uses a very peculiar system and grants her amazing abilities that no other necromancer has managed to replicate. Necromancers can control zombies, skeletons, and ghasts; Ryana specializes in zombies, but has a secondary handle on skeletons. People see Necromancers as horrible abominations. Ryana is nothing of the sort. It would take less than a day for anyone to realize that."

No one's made an update in the past 30 hours? SLACKERS!!! Well, time to update (for real this time). This will probably be my last update for quite a while, unless I decide to take Black 2 out of its wrapping and play it like I planned last month..

*Sophie & Naomi - Now some may wonder why I hacked these two. My single reason is simple; their nicknames. As far as I know, Pokemon received via Nintendo Wi-Fi have OTs of their own, and therefore cannot be nicknamed. Well.. I can't be havin' none of that. I made them as legal as possible (ie. IVs, EVs, and movesets are all legal) which can be seen for Sophie's case here. Naturally, I won't be using either of them in battles unless given permission to do so.

-Legendaries to catch:
-Same as before.Still. Lol.I'll get to it. ....I swear.

"Ryana.. She's a Necromancer. Hers, however, uses a very peculiar system and grants her amazing abilities that no other necromancer has managed to replicate. Necromancers can control zombies, skeletons, and ghasts; Ryana specializes in zombies, but has a secondary handle on skeletons. People see Necromancers as horrible abominations. Ryana is nothing of the sort. It would take less than a day for anyone to realize that."

I've been slacking a bit lately, I have to admit I didn't play White 2 at all this weekend. My XBox got all the love.

At the moment I'm searching for a female Eevee. I did catch 3 male ones, sent one to Black for breeding but I forgot to send over the 3 eggs to White 2....d'oh. Reason for wanting a female Eevee, I plan to evolve it into Espeon and a male Espeon? No....just no.

I caught myself a Trapinch, female on my first try so happy about that. Managed to beat Elesa though Zebstrika was a pain thanks to Flame Charge. Sakuya took down Emolga easily with Rock Slide then fell to Flaaffy's OP Take Down which also took out Kotoha. Zebstrika then took out Laxus and Zack before it finally fell to Remilia's Psybeam (boosted thanks to TwistedSpoon).

Clay...don't get me started on that annoying gym. Took me forever to find him. Boldore fell to Kotoha then Sandslash bit the dust until his Excadrill took out Remilia, Laxus and Zack. Managed to finally beat it with Kotoha using Leech Seed and about 10 Super Potions...

Since last time Blue the Oshawott and Flame the Monferno have evolved into a Dewott and Infernape. I also got an Eevee from Aminita and named it Shadow and evolved into a Umbreon. I also have got a Pidgey and it is a Pidgeotto named wing. I have also caught some legendary Pokemon.

Icy finally got his Pokemon ... again. He was in Aspertia City (yes, a CITY) and he chose Snivy from Bianca, who had stolen Cheren's glasses. Icy named Snivy, Leaf. Hugh, his best friend and rival, then challenged him to a battle with his Tepig, Level 5, which had been raised from an egg. He could've won, but no, we both had 2 HP left, Tepig was faster, but he did the most stupid move ever, Tail Whip. He then realized - Rivals are still as stupid as ever. c:

Icy then trained his Snivy a little bit, you know, because nothing can be too strong.

Just beat Elesa and Clay over the weekend. Dewott also evolved into Samurott, who swept through the PWT almost single-handedly. I might not continue the main story for quite some time because of my studies, as well as BP/shard grinding in the PWT.

Been a good minute since my last update, eh? Finally decided to bust out Black 2. Decided to make it a little interesting too; I've made this run-through a Single Monotype run using only Bug-types~ And, I have to say, I'm loving it~

Named myself Elena, named my rival Ryudo. I started off with Oshawott (I totally didn't do this planning to wreck my rival's Snivy/Servine/Serperior, that realization came after catching Sewaddle) Now that that's out of the way, I'm going to cut the story down to pieces since a lot took place and I don't feel like telling it all~

Route 20 - Took care of the first two Trainers using Oshawott's Water Gun, taking no time whatsoever. I immediately ran through the grass looking for a Sewaddle, only to find 5 males in a row.. Well, I kept looking, and eventually found a Lv. 2 female Sewaddle. Took no effort to catch and, upon checking her stats, she was Adamant~! Still remembering my partners from White 2, I decided to grant Sewaddle the name of a Champion; Fiona. Since he was not a Bug-type, and was also male, Oshawott got tossed into storage to be forever alone in Box 6.

Flocessy Ranch - Wrecked Ryu's Snivy with a single Bug Bite~

Aspertia City Gym - Ripped the entire Gym apart with Fiona's Bug Bite. She was Lvs. 12 ~ 14 during this time.

Route 20 - Started searching in the dark grass for a Venipede. Once again, my troubles finding a female stalk/troll me. Upon finding a Lv. 10 female Venipede, I capture it and name it Nanako, after my epic Scolipede from White 2. Upon checking her stats, I find myself amazed that, she too, was Adamant. AND had Poison Point~

Virbank Complex - Did the usual training. Fiona and Nanako reached around Lv. 25~26 before Roxie was challenged.

Lostlorn Forest - Stalked the Hidden Grotto waiting for a Combee like a reject instead of searching the grass for one or a Vespiquen, but, after going through 2 or 3 Pokemon, I finally found a female Combee at Lv. 20. I thought I had lucked out, thinking she'd learn Power Gem after evolving... Completely forgot Black 2 had Vespiquen learn Slash at Lv. 21.. Anyway, I caught her and named her Empress, after... well, you get it by now. Now.. I decided to check her nature, expecting something like Impish or Timid... Adamaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaant~ That makes 3 Adamant insects in a row~ Willing to bet this won't hold up...

LostlornForest - So, as everyone knows.. there's a Breeder in Lostlorn Forest. And, as everyone knows, they re-battle you in Black/White 2. Everyone also knows that you always abuse the kindness of Breeders~ /trollface

Nimbasa City Gym - The first three battles were cake. Over-leveled Leavanny using Razor Leaf to avoid Static = easy wins. Elesa.. well.. wasn't actually difficult for a Lv. 35 Vespiquen. Just, being slower than Emolga meant Volt Switch abuse. Elesa's Flaaffy paralyzed Empress, but she was like, "Whatevs." We kept shooting for a Power Gem as Emolga switched in from the constant Volt Switch'ing, but no dice. Empress did, however, take down Flaaffy and Zebstrika with predicted Bug Bites. She got cocky, though. Thinking she could get a Heal Order off to heal before Emolga's Volt Switch took her down, she got knocked out by a long-overdue crit. Nanako stepped in for a revenge-kill Poison Tail that took Emolga down in one shot.

"Ryana.. She's a Necromancer. Hers, however, uses a very peculiar system and grants her amazing abilities that no other necromancer has managed to replicate. Necromancers can control zombies, skeletons, and ghasts; Ryana specializes in zombies, but has a secondary handle on skeletons. People see Necromancers as horrible abominations. Ryana is nothing of the sort. It would take less than a day for anyone to realize that."

Well, it has been quite a while since my last update. I knew I wasn't going to update as much after beating the Eilte 4 but still. I've done a lot of the post game stuff like catching some Legendarys and further exploration. I have yet to capture Kyurem but I will get to it eventually. I've mostly been training my main Pokemon. The only new Leagendary I caught was Latias. I have also been exploring the Abyssal Ruins. All I'm doing right now is training up for a battle against Cynthia because my first battle...didn't go so well. Well here is my update on my Pokemon.

So I'm doing a run this time with night themed Pokemon only. Not only Dark types, but more so Pokemon that look like they would appear only in the night, or mostly in the night, and it's a rly hard thing to find tbh when you don't want JUST Dark type Pokemon. ;A;
So I decided to use my Action Replay for this thing since it's just a billion times easier to use it to get the exact Pokemon I want, so yes, I will be hacking in my Pokemon and their moves and stats and junk. You don't like it? Don't read it. D< (Cuz I still love them. <3)

Ok, so I met up with my mom and she told me to get out and get a PokeDex. Thanks mom, very motherly of you. So I meet up with my rival Hugh and he and I go together to get my Pokemon. I chose Snivy, and then it..."mutated" into a Lunatone! :'D Yay me!

So then he and I battle our newly obtained Pokemon, and I won by a landslide (with a Psychic).

Then, I continued my journey onto Floccesy Town where I met that old guy Alder and we chatted about maybe training me, but he decides that a map is more important than the well being of my Pokemon. Oh well. So I head over to Floccesy Ranch after playing in the big piles of leaves everywhere (due to it being Autumn) and found the obnoxiously friendly Herdier who didn't seem to mind playing with the Plasma Grunt that was trying to take him.

While there, I caught a Patrat, Mareep, Lilipup, and a Riolu.

I backtracked to Aspertia City to battle Cheren, and battle I did. His Pokemon stood no chance against my Lunatone's Ice Beam! >:D I got my badge, saved, and then went to bed. c:

-Obtained Starter, mah Snivy :3
-Went to Floccessy Ranch, got a Riolu.
-Fought 1st Gym, won on second try.
-Went to Virbank City, caught a Magnemite, grinded a bit for the second gym.
-Fought 2nd Gym, surprisingly won with Snivy.
-Did all of the possible movies I could do.
-Went to Castelia City, got a castelia cone and did everything I could in the city (except the gym)
-Caught a Darumaka and went to do the event in the sewers.
-Fought 3rd gym, won with ease.
-Bunch of desert grinding.
-Finally got to Nimbasa and grinded at the various sports places and < City > routes
-Afterwards, went to the amusement park place.
-Currently at the 4th gym!

So after beating Cheren I head down towards Virbank City, where OMG my Patrat "mutated" into a Gliscor. :'D
So me and my newly added Gliscor go with my Lunatone and completely wipe out Roxie and her trainers like they were nothing. Then I became a movie star and now my player gets all the ladies. B] Convinced the ship captain to return to his job after completely wiping him out of the box office, and then ran into Team Plasma once again. Beat them down like the little wimps they are, and swam across the sea to get to Castelia City, because I'm a man like that.

In Castelia City, my Mareep "mutated" into a Seviper! Oh my! So me and my new Seviper completely destroyed Team Plasma in the sewers, as well as Burgh and his trainers. now I have three badges! Neat!

Heading up to Route 4 I meet up with a weird scientist with really bad hair. Says something about making Pokemon filled with Red Bull or something idfk. Either way, Gliscor beat down his Magnemite and his Klink, and then we continued onto the Join Avenue! There, my Lillipup "mutated" into a Liepard! :'D Grinded the Hell out of my Pokemon battling everything along the way, because I forgot when that insane level spike between Leaders begins, but i didn't want any chances. Saved, and then ended my game for a while.

Update time~ As a lot of stuff happened, I'll only be covering bits and pieces~

Driftveil City Gym - Pretty much swept everyone with Fiona, cause she was a boss.

Chargestone Cave - Caught a Lv. 25 female Joltik and named her Erisa. Was pretty much the exact Joltik I caught way back when I played through White; Timid with Compoundeyes. Decided to take her back to Lostlorn Forest for Breeder-abuse training.Stopped at about Lv. 36~37, shortly after she evolved.

Mistralton City Gym - Erisa... Electroball'd ERRYTHANG. ...Well, there were some Electrowebs in there too, I guess.

Undella Town - I don't like Undella's BGM outside of Summer as much.. Anyway, utterly booty-wrecked Ryudo and went south to catch a Golduck for Strength, Surf, and (later) Waterfall. Went through the entirety of Route 14 for training.
Black City Gate - Fat guys dancing for no reason. They'll apparently disappear for no reason as well.

Lacunosa Town - I've come to appreciate Lacunosa's BGM more. Listening to it as I type this up~

Route 12 - Caught a Tranquill for Fly.

Village Bridge - Found something I have never noticed before; On the left side of a bridge there's a door down by the water. Inside is a Lady.. practicing her singing. ...I think. A girl up-top gave me Sitrus Berries for telling her what was going on.

"Ryana.. She's a Necromancer. Hers, however, uses a very peculiar system and grants her amazing abilities that no other necromancer has managed to replicate. Necromancers can control zombies, skeletons, and ghasts; Ryana specializes in zombies, but has a secondary handle on skeletons. People see Necromancers as horrible abominations. Ryana is nothing of the sort. It would take less than a day for anyone to realize that."

I've always wanted to do one of these. And now that I finally started to play White 2, I'll finally be able to! And it'll be a good activity boost after taking a nice and long leave from PC.

Judging from the length of what I typed up, this might actually count as an LP of sorts, haha. Without the visual aid, of course, because I'm lazy.

[B2W2 Travel Journal: Entry #1]

Booted the game up and picked the guy. Named him Patrick, as always.

So far the game looks neat. Walked around Aspertia City and enjoyed listening to the music. I'm loving this game already; having the hometown as a relatively bustling city is a nice change of pace. My mom seems pretty spunky, haha. Soon I met the rival, whom I named Hugh, and walked to the where Bianca was. I love it when the camera pans to a nice view at certain locations, glad that they still have that from BW (and depicted pretty early, too! I wonder if there'll be more of this later).

Chose Tepig as a starter because I've never actually played through White as Tepig, so I though I might as well pick him in the sequel! It's a hard choice, since Growlithe's available early on in this game, and Arcanine is one of my all-time favourites. But I've had an Arcanine for HeartGold (which I only recently beat, because of the surprisingly difficult Hail-infused, Blizzard-filled Red final boss battle faced against my Ice-weak team, haha), so I guess I'll leave Arcanine from my party this time. :(

Fought the rival and his Oshawott with my newly received Tepig (level 5, Rash nature; I'm okay with it since he needed a Special Attack boost anyway). It was a tough fight because Oshawott went with a Tail Whip > Tackle strategy, while Tepig is as sluggish as ever. Thankfully I pulled through with my Tackle spam, albeit at critical HP. I love Oshawott's new animation though. The scalchop tricks made the fight look more dynamic, in a way. XD

Anyway, after that I went with Bianca's obligatory tour for the newbies of the franchise. Which makes me wonder how useful this must be, since a lot of the players of the sequels, I presume, have played the first one and pretty much know what she's talking about already. But eh, give the gal her time to shine. At least she's not as ditzy as before (and looks pretty stylish with her new glasses, which may or may not be Cheren's).

Moving on, I finally got a few Pokéballs! So I shuffled around the new Route (Route 19, iirc; which I must say looks lovely in autumn) and found only a couple of Patrat and Purrloin. A bit disappointing, but I guess I can't find Tepig company so soon. I love how this Route opens to the right, though. Just like DPPt. Now if only it would open downward. I don't remember the first Route of any main series game that opens south of the hometown. But if you do, then VM me, because I'd like to be corrected and not just be a stupid jerk all talking about this for a whole paragraph.

I soon got to Floccesy Town from Alder's lead, after unintentionally grinding my Tepig from the wild Pokémon encounters that hoped for a good Poké to add to my team. Alder's still traveling the region like always, and I like how he's no longer the Champion but still keeps an air of ancestral wisdom or something like that. After a little exploring, I went ahead to Route 20 and caught my first catch! A female Sewaddle (level 4, Lonely nature, Swarm ability; I'm happy to have a nature that boosts Attack, but the Defense stat drop sounds pretty nasty; Swarm is better than Chlorophyll in game imo so yay) looking all cute and saying "Catch me!" almost subliminally, so I did. And Tepig seems pretty happy to have company. B]

Anyway, I battled my first few trainers, shuffled around the tall grass and fallen leaves (plus I sank in the leaves twice, which was a cute quirk) in order to explore and know of the Pokémon available in this Route, and after seeing an open road north, I proceeded there without a care in the world (nor any intent to look for my rival and proceed with the story).

But then I find this cool little ranch, Floccesy Ranch, which was really a better-looking ranch than the one north of Olivine City back in Johto ever was (although the valuable Moomoo Milk supply in the latter made the place a frequent pit stop). I was then surprised to see my rival and caught off-guard with a challenge! Thankfully he only had a weak little Oshawott, although I still had to switch from Sewaddle to Tepig because the former's defenses weren't good enough. So I came out victorious! Then when two ranchers approached us and made me think we were about to take part in the first double battle with rival in the game, I get informed that one of their Herdier was simply lost. Hugh seemed to be in a real hurry to help them, but I was taking my time.

And by taking my time, I mean looking for aspiring party members in the captivating tall grass just below the pair of ranchers. I shuffled around and faced even more Unova Pokémon, which I was almost getting sick of looking at, until lo and behold, a female Azurill pops out of the tall grass! Of course I'm gonna catch that; a Fire-Grass-Water type trio this early in the game sounds too sweet to pass up (even though Azurill's still a Normal-type but whatever). So I switched to my Tepig after a Water Sport and a Splash for good measure, and I proceeded to spam Ember. Until finally Azurill was at critical HP, just ripe for picking. I throw a Pokéball, spam A + Down and hope for the best... and poof! It popped out of the ball! Man Azurill has a high catch rate apparently.

But I was unfazed. After two more Pokéballs, I finally hear that short jingle, and I know that I've caught my third party member. That is, if it has Huge Power, because that ability changes everything. And I mean everything. As if the opportune events wouldn't stop coming, I actually got a Huge Power Azurill (level 5, Careful nature; which might have been a bad one what with the Special Attack stat drop but Huge Power so I don't care)! There's only one problem. I've heard female Azurill has the uncanny ability to swap genders upon evolution. Which would be so weird so I'm hoping from the one-third chance of that happening that it doesn't happen to mine. Anyway, I'm glad I decided to keep the default Pokémon names like always. Otherwise, I would have gone through the odd choice of either picking a female nick and possibly changing it upon evolution, or picking a male nick to name the female Azurill which might actually keep its gender so I'll have to change it too when that happens. After all that jazz, I just grinded a little and saved.

I'll just interject this randomly here and say: I absolutely adore the music in this game. Because I cannot stress that enough.

It seems I've played for a whole hour so far, so I guess it's a good time as any to end this here. The lost Herdier can wait. I'll always be ending my journal entries with my saved data and detailed team so far, because why not?

I have a lot of updating to do, so I'm going to break it up into a few posts. And because there's one very important update that deserves a post of it's own that will be coming up. :)

By the way, I want to just say I enjoy reading everyone else's stories immensely. It inspires me to keep going with my own! Keep it up everyone!

November 5, 2012

I had a long day at work, but I did manage to earn a new medal, making 40/56:Great Trade-Up

Dream World: Vanilluxe. Found: a Dratini that knows Water Pulse; a Sableye that knows Sucker Punch. Down to only needing to find 3 more Pokémon in the Sparkling Sea.

November 7, 2012

I took a ride on the Royal Unova to give my Pokémon some experience, and also to make some extra money in the process. I then went to the Castelia Gardens and caught yet another Eevee, this time in a Timer Ball.

I’m off to a local game convention for the weekend! But before I left, I went into the Dream World with Growlithe. In addition to gaining a level, which will come in handy for the Castelia Gym, we also found a Drilbur that knows the move Metal Sound.

In between, I think I’ll train at the Castelia Gym. I chose to take with me Rattata, Koffing, and Growlithe, as I think their mix of types is most appropriate for a bug-type gym.

November 10, 2012

Burgh has done quite a bit of… redecorating in his gym since I was first there a year and a half ago. Instead of having a connection of chambers like a honeycomb, the gym was now covered in in thin, silky threads that formed cocoons of various heights. These cocoons are used to travel between the various levels of the gym. I battled the trainers in the gym, and there was one who popped out of one of the cocoons who used a Combee in his battle!

“Combee, the Tiny Bee Pokémon. Combee are a set of three that are together from birth. They constantly gather honey from flowers. When they sleep, they gather up to form a giant hive.”

I made it to the top of the gym where Burgh was wrapped in a cocoon of his own amidst a dozen or so paint cans, some of which had spilled all over the floor to make a wet mixture of colors to walk on. I told him that I’d like to challenge him to an official gym match using the Pokémon I’ve recently caught. He agreed that we would battle tomorrow.

After doing a little more training, my Rattata evolved into a Raticate!

“Raticate, the Mouse Pokémon, and the evolved form of Rattata. Raticate whittle their constantly growing fangs by gnawing on hard things. With those long fangs, these surprisingly violent Pokémon can gnaw away even thick concrete with ease.”

175. Raticate

November 11, 2012

So by the time I got back from the convention, I was way too tired to do much of anything, including having a gym battle. So we postponed it until tomorrow, since I have off of work.

[EDIT]
Pokemon League challenge #1 is complete. Now to train for the second one and complete this Single Monotype Challenge~

Items:

Hyper Potions (70) -> 64

Full Restores (70) -> 70

Revives (30) -> 29

Max Revives (5) -> 3

-Battle Flows

-Shauntal-

This battle was pretty easy. Set up a Swords Dance with Fiona, took out Cofarigus. Chandelure showed up, got Bulldoze'd by Nanako, with a Crit for the win~ Drifblim came out, tried to Thunder with Erisa, missed. Got hit with a Shadow Ball and tried again, and hit. Golurk came out, Leaf Blade with Fiona.

-Grimsley-

Led off with Empress to Attack Order Liepard, Acrobatics Scrafty, and Attack Order Krookodile. Had Nanako take care of Bisharp with Bulldoze.

-Marshall-

Had some slight trouble here. Led off with Empress again to Acrobatics ERRYTHANG~ Sawk, however, was faster than me and got a Rock Slide in that knocked me to half HP and flinched me. Used a Hyper Potion to stall for a miss, got one the next turn, then got crit'd by the next Rock Slide.. Had Erisa come in and Thunder to finish this off.

-Caitlin-

Pretty simple. Nanako took two Steamrollers to take out Musharna, and fell asleep from Yawn. Erisa came in to take care of Sigilyph with Thunder. Reuniclus took a Bug Buzz, lived, and hit me with Psychic. It got healed, I countered with Electroweb, then followed-up with another Bug Buzz. Gothitelle went down in one Bug Buzz.

-Iris-

This one got difficult. Lead off with Fiona to X-Scissor Hydreigon right off the bat. 1HKO. Druddigon came out, and I thought I could setup a Swords Dance to try and sweep Haxorus out of the battle. ...Nope. Fiona took a Flamethrower to the knee. I knew Nanako could take a Flamethrower, so she started Bulldozing, with the second getting a crit. Archeops showed up and I prayed Erisa was faster. And she was. Archeops took a Thunder to the neck and went down. Aggron took a Bulldoze crit to the shin. Haxorus.. Nanako got a Steamroller off and flinched Haxorus, so I figure it'll Dragon Dance next turn for speed. I heal, it Dual Chops. I try for another Steam-flinch.. I get Earthquaked.

I send in Erisa to watch Haxorus get healed, and we follow-up with a Thunder Wave. I Electroweb twice to counter the two Dragon Dances it gets up, only to see I can now finish it with Bug Buzz. Lapras got Thunder'd in the neck in went down in one shot.

"Ryana.. She's a Necromancer. Hers, however, uses a very peculiar system and grants her amazing abilities that no other necromancer has managed to replicate. Necromancers can control zombies, skeletons, and ghasts; Ryana specializes in zombies, but has a secondary handle on skeletons. People see Necromancers as horrible abominations. Ryana is nothing of the sort. It would take less than a day for anyone to realize that."

“My bug-type Pokémon have been scurrying with excitement to get to battle you again,” Burgh told me. “You remember my great Pokémon! Remember my Dwebble’s round little eyes, and how resilient and reliable it is? Or my ace Leavanny, who makes clothes for Pokémon out of leaves!”

“I can’t wait to see your new team!” I tossed my first Poké Ball. “Koffing, maximize!”

“Come out, dear Swadloon!” Burgh responded as he sent out his first Pokémon. I definitely had the type advantage.

“Ok, Koffing, start off with a Smokescreen!” Thick, dark smoke came pouring out of the holes all over my Koffing’s body.

“Trying to hide, I see! But we’re ready for that.” Burgh talked and moved with great arm gestures. “Swadloon, tie it up with your String Shot!”

So we were both starting off by using attacks to lower our opponent’s stats. But Koffing isn’t too fast to begin with, so I wasn’t too worried about it losing speed.

“Now, fire Razor Leaf along the line into the smog!” Swadloon followed its trainer’s command, and landed a hit on Koffing, though it was not very effective.

“Our turn,” I said. “Koffing, use Sludge!”

The blast of poison fired out of the smoke cloud and hit Swadloon for super-effective damage!

“Lights, please!” yelled Burgh. “Time to show you what bug-type Pokémon are made of! Swadloon, use Razor Leaf again!” The attack hit again, but Koffing brushed it off as easily as the last one.

“Koffing, finish this with one more Sludge attack!” The attack was more than enough to knock out Burgh’s Swadloon.

“Swadloon is unable to battle,” the judge said as he raised his arm. “Koffing wins the round!”

“Well done, Koffing, now return and take a rest,” I switched out my Pokémon. “Raticate, you’re up next, maximize!”

“That must be the Rattata you caught in the sewers underneath this very city! It looks like you’ve raised it well!” Burgh complimented. “Let’s see how it does against my Dwebble! Come out!”

“I’m going to start out strong,” I said. “Raticate, use Hyper Fang!”

“Dodge it, Dwebble!” Burgh’s Pokémon nimbly jumped out the way of Raticate’s attack! “Now show them your new move, and use Rock Polish!”

“Ah, that fearsome look pierces right to my soul!” Burgh is always the artist. “Dwebble, ruin that stare with Smack Down!”

Dwebble’s fast movements allowed it to quickly throw a rock at Raticate, making it stagger back a bit.

“Hang in there, Raticate!” I encouraged my Pokémon. “Get back in there and use Bite!”

“Keep showing them your artistic moves, Dwebble, and use Rock Polish again!” Though Dwebble did take the hit from Bite, its speed continues to increase from another stat boosting move. “Now use Smack Down and knock it back again!”

“Raticate, use Sucker Punch, quick!” My Pokémon did manage to get in the move preemptively, but it still took damage from its opponent’s attack as well.

“Don’t let them recover,” called Burgh. “Smack Down, once more!”

The Smack Down attack landed a critical hit on my struggling Raticate, leaving it with very little strength left.

“You can do it, Raticate! Hyper Fang, let’s go!” It struggled, but it did manage to chomp down on Dwebble with the attack, though it didn’t do much damage.

“Raticate, you showed great endurance. Return, and take a good rest.” I knew I needed to switch tactics. “Ok, Koffing, you’re up again!”

Koffing took the field. It was a little tired from having battled already, but still had a lot of energy left.

“You’re probably going to try to lower Dwebble’s accuracy like you did with Swadloon,” Burgh analyzed. “But we’re ready for that. Dwebble, hit it with your Faint Attack!”

Faint Attack never misses, so Smokescreen would be useless.

“Now, follow up with Smack Down!” The second attack hit as well, and caused Koffing to fall out of the air by negating its Levitate ability!

“We’ve got to slow down that Dwebble,” I stated. “Koffing, use Clear Smog!”

Clear Smog surrounded Dwebble, and cancelled all the speed boosts from its Rock Polish move.

“No fair!” I cried. Dwebble was fully healed from the potion it was given. “Fine, we can handle it. Koffing, blast it with Sludge!”

I was hoping for Sludge to poison Dwebble, but no such luck. Dwebble countered with another Smack Down, and this time, Koffing was really struggling. It got off one more Sludge attack before Dwebble finished it off with yet another Smack Down.

“Koffing is unable to battle,” the judge said as he raised his arm, this time in the gym leader’s direction. “Dwebble wins this round!”

“Koffing, return,” I said as the red beam removed my knocked out Pokémon from the battlefield. “You did a great job. We’ll still win this, don’t worry.”

This might be a problem. Raticate can’t take another hit. And my last Pokémon is at a huge type disadvantage. But, I have to risk it.

“Growlithe, I choose you!” Out came my final choice. “Quickly, use Flame Wheel on Dwebble!”

“An artistic choice, straight from the heart!” commented Burgh. “Dwebble, dodge it and use Rock Polish!”

Great, Rock Polish is increasing its speed again, and now it’s faster than my Growlithe.

“Follow that up with Smack Down!”

“Growlithe, Flame Wheel, one more time!”

Both attacks were super-effective! Growlithe took massive damage from the attack, but came out on top.

“Dwebble is unable to battle. Growlithe wins!”

“Great job, Growlithe!” It replied triumphantly with a bark. “Hang in there a little longer for me!”

“Dwebble, return, very well done.” Burgh’s last Pokémon was no surprise. “I’ve got a bad feeling about this. Could I be in trouble? Leavanny, come out!”

“I figured as much! Growlithe, get ready!”

“Leavanny, use Cut on Growlithe!"

Leavanny was faster than Growlithe! Leavanny slashed at my already worn out Pokémon, and Growlithe was barely holding on. (1hp!)

“You can do it, Growlithe! Flame Wheel, let’s go!”

Not surprisingly, Burgh’s bug and grass-type Pokémon, though strong, was no match for the fire-type attack. The battle was over, and the judge declared me the victor!

“You are still as strong as ever, even with new Pokémon,” commented Burgh. “It’s no surprise I lost. Take this Insect Badge for your new badge case! And keep working hard, and always remember, it’s the little things that count!”

After winning my gym battle, I headed back to the Castelia Gardens. I caught a few more Eevee, including one in a Nest Ball and one in a Dive Ball. (I also caught a pair of female Eevee during my search.) It looks like I now have my 7 Eevee, and can start training them to evolve into their various evolutionary forms.

Dream World: Amoongus. Found: nothing new; Teddiursa with Crunch.

That evening, I decided to take a ride on the Royal Unova to battle any trainers onboard. I had Igglybuff, Onix, Sunkern, and one of my Eevee transferred to me. It was actually some tough match-ups; I had to use a lot of items, and I barely won my last battle with only my Eevee being still able to fight.

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